


Admit Impediments

by madame_faust



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Blue Mountains | Ered Luin, Durin Family, Dwarves In Exile, Dysfunctional Family, F/M, Frerin Lives, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-15
Updated: 2017-07-31
Packaged: 2018-11-14 14:22:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11209857
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madame_faust/pseuds/madame_faust
Summary: Think of this as a kind of continuation of 'To the Marriage of True Minds, or, To the Edge of Doom' - because we can't get enough of Erebor's Most Dysfunctional Marriage. But we are in the Ered Luin, after all. And anything's possible. (A series of loosely-related vignettes, most focused on the Durin Family in Exile - the WHOLE family, I mean.)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I wanted to write about Thráin and Freya in exile and we can't have Thráin and Freya without Frerin (we really, really can't), so he's here too! These are more one-offs within a related universe than anything else, so I might play with time and family relationships. But I can't help think with enough time in the West, maybe they'll reconcile! There's got to be something in the water over there that makes people so sweet, there's a chance it'll rub off.

The West was everything Freya had imagined and nothing she had hoped for. Oh, to be sure, she’d hoped. Hoped they’d be received with pomp and splendor. Hoped they’d be housed in the central range, closest to what passed for the seat of government of the cobbled-together legislature of a region still bearing the scars of the War of Wrath. Hoped she wouldn’t be working her fingers to the bone like a scullery, scrubbing out shirts and linens and washcloths.

Hoped, certainly, but had not expected anything less than red, chapped hands, a four-room hovel, and an apartment that was dug deep into the rock and connected to absolutely nothing of importance - even the privy was outside. 

They’d certainly come a long way and fallen a great distance from Erebor, which even in her mind was seeming less and less her home and more an imaginary city from a faery story. When had she slept in rooms whose windows were nothing more or less than panes of ornamental glass that, if opened, looked out on nothing more than the white-marble facades of the other royal residences and the bustling streets of a glorious mountain city? When had she adorned herself in red and purple robes and coats, bedecking her beard with emeralds merely because she thought the color offset her eyes beautifully? And when had she labored for her own satisfaction, to give glory to her Maker and her Craft alone?

Not in thirty years - and it might as well have been a lifetime. 

“Could be worse,” Frerin chirruped in her ear as he took in the disapproving expression on his mother’s face the first time she surveyed the rooms. “Could be _upstairs_.”

“I’d never have taken it,” Freya said without a thought. “Why pay rent when we can live under the open sky for free?”

Thráin had bristled at that, saying he’d rather a roof above than nothing at all and she’d shot back that there wasn’t much difference in her mind between a tent and the thatching that was somehow meant to keep out the wind and the rain and all other manner of weather that those top-floor dwellers found themselves contending with. But of course, she shouldn’t be surprised that he was so undiscerning, with such a mother as he had. Made of earth and water and sunlight, rather than rock and fire.

And hadn’t _that_ set him off? By the time he finished railing at her for disrespecting his amad, they were both furious with one another, red-faced from shouting, and all the children had all gone off somewhere. They had a bad habit of disappearing when she wanted them most. 

“I’ll just be taking myself off to the public pump, then,” she said testily. “This place is absolutely _filthy._ ”

Thráin likely muttered something about dirt roads and clean stone floors, but she had already left, slamming the door behind her. It would look petty to double back, just to continue the fight.  
Water pail clutched tightly in her hands, Freya squared her shoulders and marched out into the sunlight - unseasonably warm for the time of year, she thought, but she would not squint and she would not cower. She mightn’t have a crown or a throne, but she would _look_ queenly, at least. The people were owed that much. 

The lush rolling hills around her dwelling gave way to the low-rising peaks of the Blue Mountains, so named for their color in the early-morning light. They were dotted over with greenery, trees, and vegetation since they did not have such elevation that there wasn’t air enough for plants to thrive. Nothing at all like her home; compared to Erebor these were nothing but mossy boulders. Boulders she was not permitted to _live_ in. No, not she, she was fit only for a hole dug into the ground like a burrow for a rabbit. Or a snake. 

In the First Age of their world, the Seven Dwarven Kingdoms had splendor enough among them that they prompted jealousy and wars even among dwarrowkind. The earliest years of their histories were stained red with the blood of feuding relations, or rival kingdoms competing for gold and gems. But they were long past that now - out of necessity, if not inclination. Their kind were too few to fight each other for lands. And so hostile was the aboveground world to Mahal’s children that they would spill their own blood in defense of other lands. In defense of lands that perhaps, ought not be defended. 

Ah, but the thought of Khazad-dûm got her blood up. Even now. Even after they _knew_ that Durin’s Bane lurked still beneath Her glittering walls and vaulted ceilings. Even after so many were slain in Her defense that there was room enough for Longbeard settlements in the West since so many Broadbeam and Firebeard dwarves had lost their lives in the long and ugly battle so recently finished. 

Freya had wandered far from the public pump and was making her way down quiet back alleys and roads that could only be called ‘streets’ in theory - the earth beneath her boots was cracked and the green grass threatened to cover over the path in spots. The villagers were few and no one really looked at her, though she could not really blame them (in spite of her best efforts to display a royal mein). She might be any Broadbeam goodwife with her short, stout frame, and golden hair. And perhaps there was some of that ancestry in her veins - both her parents had been yellow-haired and their forms favored stout roundness, rather than the black-haired, dark-complexioned, ranginess of Clan Longbeard.

And yet, Longbeard she was, Erebor-born, back to her ten-times great-grandfathers no matter _what_ color her hair was. She did not _belong_ here. They did not _belong_ here. And yet. 

Her wanderings had taken her close enough to the central peak of the range that she could spy guardsmen - many redheaded Firebeards that made her heart clench in her chest when she thought of poor Heidrek, her cousin’s son...but to think of Heidrek would make her think of Fundin. And to think of Fundin would make her think of Loni. And to think of Loni would make her think of Caedís. And if she thought of Caedís she’d think of Dóra. And Heidrún. And then she’d find herself weeping in front of a foreign royal guard. And that could _not_ happen.

She did not think of Heidrek, then, nor any of the other children who were gone. She just turned on her heel and pretended that she knew exactly where she was going,that she had a purpose and it was going to be fulfilled. 

Thorin was alone in their apartment when she returned, armed with his own bucket and rag. He seemed surprised to see her when she walked in. 

“I was cleaning,” he said and Freya couldn’t say what annoyed her more. The fact that he felt the need to explain himself, as if she couldn’t plainly see what he was doing, or the fact that he said it so _apologetically._ Thorin was forever apologizing, in his voice, in his looks, and she had no patience for it. She couldn’t tell him, of course. Then he would begin to apologize in earnest. “Adad said you’d been gone a while and might not be coming back any time - ”

“Your Adad is...well, nevermind what he is,” Freya eyed her son’s progress critically - why, oh, _why_ had he begun with the floor? Couldn’t he see that the walls needed doing first? She walked right over the damp and shining spot he’d been scrubbing at, trailing dirt behind her - she’d just need to wash it all again, so it hardly mattered if she spoiled his progress. “Where is he?”

“He and Dís and Dwalin went to the forge,” he said, eyes darting to the mess she’d made of the previously clean floor. He didn’t say anything, but she saw his mouth tighten slightly. 

She looked at him and waited for Thorin to continue; she fancied she actually saw him wilting under her gaze. 

“Balin’s...out and about,” he offered.

Apparently he was going to play dense; well, Dwalin _was_ his dearest friend, so she couldn’t say she was surprised when Thorin decided to lapse into idiocy. “And your brother?”

Thorin sank even lower on his knees so that he was sitting on the floor. For a big, strapping lad he certainly knew how to make himself disappear - not a good trait in a king and one he’d unfortunately inherited from his father. “Out and about.”

Out and about was certainly good enough for Balin - he was of age these sixty years and she was neither his Master nor his mother so it did not trouble Freya too much about where he took himself during the day, so long as he was with them at nights. The lad had some ridiculous notion and he and his brother would take rooms on their own, which she dismissed before he’d completed the thought. But Balin could keep to himself most of the time. But her youngest son - who had served as a soldier, certainly, but was still very much seventy-three years of age - she had the right to keep a closer eye on.

“He’ll be back for supper,” Thorin lied. Freya could always tell when he was lying for he couldn’t look at her face when he spoke and he had a habit of clenching his fists. The poor rag in his hand would be reduced to so much lint. 

“I suppose it’s no matter,” she said finally. “For your brother’s as slovenly as they come. Up with you, then, and help me with the rest of the room. I’m sure it’ll need re-painting, but we’ll at least make this place less of a hovel, to start with.”

“Aye, ma’am,” Thorin said. He bent to pick up his own bucket, when Freya seized him by his shirtfront and brought his face down so that she could kiss his cheek. 

“And why are you here all by your lonesome?” she asked, looking into his lovely blue eyes. 

Thorin shrugged, but met her gaze when he said, “I thought giving the place a scrub might please you.”

“Only if you do it properly,” she said as she released him. “So let’s do it properly.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What happens when the chattiest dwarf in the West (well, one of the chattiest dwarves anyway) meets the surliest dwarf in the East? Eh, it doesn't go as badly as you'd think.

Thráin generally arrived at the forge well after the children and so rarely saw the local miner who’d somehow struck up a friendship with Frerin. Even as a prince of the realm he’d seldom been inclined to strike up new acquaintances - most of the dwarves he’d counted among his friends were either related to him or had been brought to his attention by those who were already related to him. Now, as King in Exile, he was even more given to keeping himself to himself than before; he was forced to interact with near-strangers in the Blue Mountains proper on a weekly basis and he’d no desire to subject himself to more strangers in between his working hours. 

Freya was much the same. Always more sociable than himself, she nevertheless clung to those old ties of kinship that were Erebor-wrought. She’d not even deigned to set foot in the bake shop that the children were practically living in - though she couldn’t cook worth a damn any more than the rest of them. As far as Thráin was aware, if Freya ventured beyond the open-air market in the valley, it was either to her cousin Vigg’s butchery or Irpa’s weaving-room. She would interact with their Blue Mountains neighbors out of necessity, but something about setting foot on their property didn’t sit well with her. 

Thráin wasn’t fussed much either way; they didn’t - couldn’t - claim any part of this range for their own, so what did it matter whose pub or workroom they frequented? It wasn’t as though they were _staying_. 

He led by example in this regard; if the King would shop at Broadbeam bake shops or burn his coal from Firebeard mines, why should the rest not do the same? And, in small numbers, natives of the Blue Mountains were just starting to poke their heads into Erebor businesses or thumb through the pickings on their tinker’s and peddler’s carts. And one of the first foreigners who’d given over his hard-earned coin to Longbeard hands was Víli the miner. 

He’d gotten so chummy with Thráin’s own sons that the lads (plus Dwalin, though that practically went without saying) had gotten an invitation to sup at the miner’s mother’s house. It sat ill with him, but he allowed it - Frerin no doubt had agreed without thinking of consequences and likely so quickly that Thorin could not revoke their acceptance without appearing rude. Dís was spared anything to do with the matter since she was shunted so much between her parents that Thráin was doubtful she’d become at all acquainted with the family. Only coming to the forge in the afternoons with her father, it was unlikely their paths had crossed; the miner and his cousins only came round at dawn. 

If it seemed he was overthinking the problem, that was because he likely had. It was always Thráin’s way, to burn away at an idea ‘til it was brittle from overheating. 

_Paranoid_ , Óin, his cousin, often said. _Suspicious. For a fellow with only one eye, you cast more wary glances in a day than dwarves with two eyes do in a lifetime._

There was something in it. No sooner had Thráin heard of the invitation to dinner than he’d wondered over just what it was those Broadbeams really wanted. Power? Good luck with that, he had to send missives ahead asking whether or not he might come in to discuss some paltry matter of his people’s survival. Money? Laughable; any spare coin they had went to helping those worse-off than themselves...and, admittedly, to the bake shop. That Víli fellow might be stood a pork pie one day and no more than that. 

Though to hear Thorin tell it - and he _had_ replayed the evening as if he was recounting a crime he was witness to - all they’d wanted was some company. And _that_ alone was unaccounted for within all of Thráin’s paranoid musings. 

So, why had he let them go? Even though it turned out there was no harm in it, why take the chance?

Because he was king. And whatever other Clans might say, in bitter recollection, his father had been a very good king. Before he tried sorting out just what manner of king Thráin II was going to be, he thought he might as well follow his example, for a bit. 

No doubt in his mind - Thrór would have let them go. Nay, his father would have found some way to invite himself along, charmed the mistress of the household and sung after-dinner lays with the sons. By evening’s end they would have departed as the dearest of friends. Such attention was not in Thráin’s nature. He found himself so up to his neck in new acquaintances, day in and day out, that by the time he was ready to go home, he could hardly stand to talk to his own family. If he couldn’t bear such an outing himself, the least Thráin could do was give his blessing. 

He’d no obligation to them, after all. What was the harm?

At least that was what he thought up until the fateful day he found himself alone in the forge. Freya flat-out refused to do the laundry on her own and demanded that all of her children accompany her. Dwalin gamely agreed to make himself useful with the wringing out and Thráin, knowing that most of the village would be down the river anyway, assumed he could keep things in line at the forge on his own. Honestly, he preferred a quiet start to the morning.

The children’s propensity to lie-in when the sun was peeking over the horizon had come entirely from their mother’s side. Thráin himself was always an early riser (and a terrible sleeper), so he was entirely used to stoking the fire in the morning, and preparing for the day. He liked the quiet. He liked the dark, the pre-dawn glow that reminded him of blessed torchlight and not the harsh glare of the sun to which he’d be subjected to all too soon. Made him think of home, but not so much that he’d get mournful. It was a quiet, comfortable feeling all too soon snatched away by chattering children and customers with orders to fill or pick up. 

It hadn’t been this way in Erebor. There he worked for the work’s own sake, not from necessity. He could take his time. He could head to the forges when it was quietest, concentrate on his task and become so labor-focused that even if someone was to speak to him, he’d be forgiven not hearing or replying. 

But a fine blacksmith didn’t need to concentrate to make a hook or shoe a horse. Not to the exclusion of all else. Which was why he didn’t jump when he was hailed, though he’d taken no notice of anyone approaching. 

“Good morrow!” a very _loud_ voice sounded behind him as he was coaxing the fire back to light. “And how are we...you...ah...oh.”

Thráin turned round and found himself looking at a ruddy-faced, golden haired miner. Short, but substantially built. He supposed this was the famous Víli. And that he would have to talk to him. Damn.

“Can I do anything for you?” Thráin asked. He rather thought not. The mattock the miner wielded looked used, but in decent shape. Mayhap he was expecting to do some repair work around his home and came in search of nails.

Probably should have written himself a list, for the miner looked flustered at the question, shufflings his feet and hemming and hawwing, first to the tops of his boots, then skyward, then finally got out a reply.

“Ah, nay...er, that is to say...I’m sure your skill’s up to anything, sir, only I just come...er...I come for… _conversing_ , y’see. Not for work,” Víli explained.

The only reply Thráin made was the raise his remaining eyebrow. Conversation? All Thráin heard was that this lad was preventing _his_ lads from starting a good day’s work. Not a fine reflection on his character.

“Everyone alright?” Víli asked. Evidently he was not as adept as most miners were at understanding unspoken communication. He wondered how he’d managed to survive so long...or perhaps he’d merely been lucky. 

“Beg pardon?” Thráin asked.

Víli seemed to believe that Thráin was hard of hearing; he repeated himself more loudly. “Everyone alright? Thorin and Frerin and Dwalin and them? Only they’re usually here, of a morning.”

“They’re helping with the laundry,” Thráin replied, folding his arms and setting his mouth in a line beneath his beard. Hopefully that would be the end of it.

It was not.

“Oh!” Víli’s voice and expression lightened at once. “Good! Well, don’t know as I’d say laundering is a great pleasure, only I was afeared one of ‘em took ill or somesuch. Good to know they’re all in good health and that. S’all we’ve got at the end of the day, eh?”

Thráin recalled suddenly that Víli had an injured family member - it was what prompted Thorin to go on his little writing campaign that endeared the royal family to the dwarves of the West in the first place. The lords and ladies - and evidently, the commonfolk - thought it very proper and very kind for Thorin to write to the families of the fallen and injured, informing them of their loved one’s sacrifice. So did Thráin, come to that, though he suspected Thorin’s motivation had more to do with excising guilt than anything else. Still, it was too bad about Víli’s kinsman. 

“I suppose,” Thráin said. Then, for duty’s sake, added, “How’s yours coming along?”

“Well as can be expected,” Víli said brightly, in what Thráin expected was a pat answer. Certainly sounded a trifle rehearsed. That was to be expected. What was not expected was the extended follow-up answer.

“He’s got good days when he remembers us all and where he’s at and what he’s about and,” the lad continued, resting his elbows on the countertop casually, “...not so good days. But we’re hoping for the best. Unlikely as he’ll be able to go back underground any time soon - mining, I mean, we’re all of us miners! But his hands are good still and anyhow Bifur was always Made to be a toymaker. Made to be, but not meant to be! You know how that goes!”

Actually, he did not. The dwarves among whom Thráin had been raised were more or less free to choose the craft for which they felt they had been Made. True, he, his father, his sons, and his daughter all went in for smithing, but that was common among their forebears. If Thorin had wanted to go in for scholarship or a maintainer of the archives (as looked likely for a time), he would have been free to do so, will little eyebrow raising from his kin. Well, with the exception of Thráin’s mother who couldn’t understand why a dwarf would read for pleasure rather than necessity. The longest document she’d ever read (she often boasted) was her marriage contract. 

Smithing turned out to be a more useful trade on the road than academics, but that didn’t mean it was more valuable or that it was a craft to be foisted upon someone unwilling. The only thing they none of them could leave off was kingship, but that wasn’t a craft, only a duty. Not a light one at that, even in exile, but at least Thráin could always off himself to the forge when he wanted to use his hands and collect his thoughts. Well. Most days.

“Your people are miners?” he asked. “Going back a while, I take it.”

The lad nodded enthusiastically with not just his head, but his neck and shoulders as well. “Oh, aye, mostly. We some of us went in for guarding or suchlike, but me Mam and...her kinfolk and all have been in the mines since the range were resettled. Was a time when I was meant to go ‘prenticing for a goldsmith, but...ah...didn’t work out. Still, don’t know as I’d be happier in that occupation than I am now! ‘Leastaways I can dine with me kinfolk, most days! And it’s not too far to go for work neither.”

“But you’ve come out of your way,” Thráin pointed out, nodding toward the coal mines in the hills beyond them. 

“Aye, so I have,” Víli said, a mite sheepishly, whipping his head round as though double-checking the location of the hills. “I come round this way most mornings. I’m up afore the sun anyhow, so I get me breakfast and a bit o’talk to see me off.”

...a bit of talk? In the opposite direction of his workplace. _Before_ he was scheduled to arrive. It seemed a bit inexplicable to Thráin who would never do such a thing himself. Why would he? Even when he was an apprentice, all his friends tended to be family or his fellows in craft. There was _one_ exception, but that was a near accidental meeting. What Víli had in common with them, he could not even begin to imagine - unless it was a propensity for talk. Frerin could chatter as long and fast as anyone Thráin had ever known. Dwalin could also carry on, when he was in the mood. But Thorin? The lad was nearly as closed-lipped among strangers as Thráin himself. He’d have expected his elder son to shoo this Víli away if he was bringing only conversation and not coin to their forge.

Some of Thráin’s musings must have showed on his face for Víli said, brightly, “It’s become the best part o’me morning. Don’t know as I can do me work proper without it! I’ve got used to having you all come to town, I’m pleased as punch you found a place amongst us.”

It was not the wisest thing he might have said. If Thráin was a more impulsive dwarf, Víli might have found himself sprawled on his backside for such a thoughtless remark. 

Amongst them. Amongst _them_. As if hovels in the West compared to splendors in the East. As if this was something they’d _wanted_. Such a life as this was something he could not have imagined in Erebor. And this miner had the gall to say he was glad of it.

Slowly, Thráin raised his head until he was looking that Víli plain in the face. He was about to loose his tongue, curse him, and his father, and his ten-times great grandfathers. Nothing, in that moment, would have pleased him more than to wipe that smug, mocking, smirk off his face. WIth words or fists. 

But he faultered. For Víli wasn’t smirking at all. Just grinning at him. Cheerfully and plainly. As if he didn’t mean any offense and wouldn’t know how to give it if he tried. Thráin knew a dwarf who could smile like that. Only one. He’d never expected to see such a smile again, until he was gone to the Halls of his Maker. 

It so turned his head that Thráin’s hands unclenched and, though he swallowed thickly, he didn’t say another word. In fact, he went on staring so long that Víli seemed to have run out of things to say, he merely rocked back on his heels and said, “Well, best be scurrying along - pleasure to make your acquaintance, sir, and no mistaking. Give me and me Mam’s best to you and yours - oh, and Bofur, Bombur’s and Bifur’s too, while you’re at it, I’m sure they wish you all very well!”

With a shallow bow and a bounce in his step, Víli took his leave of Thráin, who only managed to croak out a hollow, “And to you and yours,” to Víli’s retreating back. The lad had to have heard him, quiet though he was, for he paused and turned round, favoring Thráin with another gold-bright grin as he waved over his shoulder at him.

The lad was all cheek and impertinence. Thráin might have been justified giving him a solid thrashing for his disrespect. He _certainly_ expected to give Thorin an earful when next he saw the lad. But all the bluster went out of him. Despite his rage, he couldn’t give voice to it. 

The next time there was laundering to be done, he’d go with Freya on his own. The children could mind the stall. He’d rather a day of soaking, scrubbing, and wringing than a morning of un-asked for visitors.


End file.
